Matchday 17: Bayern win first (imaginary) Title of the Season

By: Jan | December 18th, 2007

Wolfsburg’s players celebrate The first half of the season is officially over, and Bayern have claimed the so called Herbstmeisterschaft (autumn championship), which doesn’t mean anything and isn’t won in autumn either. But a lot in football is about psychology and weird statistics. One weird statistic says that 87% of the teams who won the autumn championship also won the championship for real. Other important insights from last weekend:

The kind of dominance €70 million can buy
Bayern have topped the table from start to finish. That is quite impressive. There has only been one team in Bundesliga history, who has managed this feat twice before. They didn’t need that much money to do it, but they were called Bayern Munich as well.

The kind of dominance €70 million can buy
Bayern topped the table on goal differential after the first matchday, and it still is only on goal differential after seventeen matchdays. A disappointing 0-0 draw against Hertha for Bayern and an entertaining 5-2 victory over Leverkusen for Bremen made it possible.

Angela shared her views on Bayern’s match and their recent performances over at the Bayern Munich Offside.

The 0-0 draw was understandably anything but disappointing for Abby from the Hertha Offside.

The feel-good story of the weekend
Ivan Klasnic recently celebrated his return to professional football, after suffering two kidney transplants. He now also celebrated his goalscoring return with a brace and an assist. A story worth telling separately.

Kevin Fylan from the Reuters Soccer Blog has written a post about this incredible achievement, and Chris from The Offside has done the same.

Hamburg blew third big point in a row
They first lost against Bremen in the nothern derby, then they failed to win against Cottbus and then were lucky to escape Karlsruhe with a draw (1-1) this weekend. Huub Stevens’ team could have easily been level on points with Bremen and Bayern, but now go into the second half of the season with a four point gap to the top spots. Which is a bit unfortunate, because I had Hamburg very high on my list of title candidates. Maybe the team can’t handle the pressure. Huub Stevens seems to think so, as he very decidedly went back to his old rhetoric of saying that a) Bayern Munich are champions already and b) Hamburg’s sole goal is to do better than last season.

Schalke sneak up on the Champions League spots
To be fair to Schalke, they did play some great and entertaining matches this season. A lot of them have been draws (vs Bremen, vs Stuttgart, vs Chelsea…) and some have been high scoring victories (vs Hanover). But even more matches have been lacklustre, like the 2-1 win over Nuremberg this weekend. 10 points from the last four matches have nonetheless catapulted Schalke into a very good position to challenge Hamburg for the third Champions League spot.

Stuttgart lose two Mexicans, one German and another game
Stuttgart could have been in the same position as Schalke, lurking behind Hamburg, waiting for them to surrender the third Champions League spot. A mixed bag of two victories and two defeats in their last four matches, sees them lurking behind the surprise teams Hanover and Karlsruhe instead. Early in the season, defeats were blamed on injuries (rightfully to some extent), while their 2-0 defeat at the hands of Arminia Bielefeld (of all teams) was blamed on the referee (rightfully to some extent). He denied Stuttgart a valid penalty and failed to call a foul on Ricardo Osorio, which eventually resulted in Bielefeld taking the lead. Armin Veh was then sent off by the referee for his bitching at the sidelines. Pavel Pardo was sent off with a second yellow for a rather soft foul earlier. Only Ricardo Osorio can’t complain about his red card.

A glimmer of hope for the east
Cottbus followed up their 0-0 draw against Hamburg with their highest ever Bundesliga victory, beating Hanover 5-1. They are still on a relegation spot, but won’t be willing to leave the Bundesliga without a fight. The same holds true for Hansa Rostock, who beat Bochum 2-0 and can enjoy the luxury of spending the winter break outside of the relegation zone.